One More Time
It was raining. Joe couldn’t play soccer, so his mum said it would be a good day for him to clean the bird cage.
Joe didn’t like this job. He thought he would have a pillow fight with the stuffed sloth first.
“I’m going to see if I can move you across the room with one whack,” he said. Of course, the sloth just stared at Joe with its eyes.
Joe whacked the sloth with the pillow, but it didn’t budge. He whacked it again and again. His mum looked in through the door. “Don’t do that,” she said.
“One more time,” whispered Joe. He gave the sloth a huge whack. But the pillow ripped and out floated a cloud of white feathers.
Joe put the feathers back into the pillow. “I’ll have to sew up this pillow now,” he said to the sloth.
Joe found a needle and some red thread. “It won’t matter that it’s red,” he said. “Mum will never know.”
Joe poked the sloth as he went to clean the bird cage. Don’t get too comfortable,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
The cage was full of bird feathers and seeds.
Joe suddenly had an idea. The vacuum cleaner would be quicker than a brush. Joe pushed the vacuum cleaner into the cage. He liked the sound the seeds made as they were sucked down the hosepipe. His mum looked in through the door. “Don’t do that,” she said.
“One more time,” whispered Joe.
Joe poked the cleaner into a pile of feathers. They flew like snowflakes around the cage. He didn’t notice the bird and it was sucked up the hosepipe.
Joe quickly turned off the cleaner and opened the bag. There was the bird, flapping its dusty feathers. “You silly bird,” said Joe. “Why were you hiding?” He cleaned its feathers and put it back in the cage.
It was still raining. Joe thought rainy days were boring. Then he had an idea. His mum’s big bed was perfect for flipping on.
Joe had just finished a really big flip when his mum went past the door. “Don’t do that,” she said.pushed
Joe really loved flipping and his mother had gone. “One more time,” he whispered. “She’ll never know.”
Joe bounced really high. For just a second he felt as if he was flying like a bird. Then he lost control. His feet came down on a glass table. A lamp crashed onto the floor and the glass table shattered. Joe saw red blood dripping on the white sheets and he screamed. It was a long, loud scream and then he fainted.
When Joe woke up, he was at the hospital and his mother was there. “You were lucky,” she said. “It could have been worse.”
Then she smiled a funny kind of smile. “I’ve fixed the pillow and finished cleaning the bird cage,” she said.
“Mothers,” thought Joe. “How do they know everything?”
Word Bank
budge    to move the position of something
comfortable    feeling relaxed
control    the power to manage something
fainted    passed out
fixed    repaired or mended
flapping    moving up and down
flipping    turning over
idea    a thought or a plan of action
matter    to be important
notice    to see something
perfect    excellent in every way
sew    to join things with a needle and thread
shattered    broke suddenly into small pieces
stuffed    filled with something
sucked    drawn in by suction
thread    a long, thin piece of cotton or wool used for sewing
(本文选自外研社《多维阅读》第 15 级)

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